Above the doors in most modern cars there is a handle.

 

 

This handle is for holding onto when you are getting into an out of the car. This is its only purpose and it isn't actually built to handle anything more than that. It really isn't built to take a great deal of stress or lateral force. Some people don't even know the bar is there, for you really only use it if you are injured, old, or infirm. However, it is also within easy reach and often people will grab it in times of stress for the additional illusion of stability it grants. There is a high incidence of people grabbing onto this bar before an accident and actually causing more injury than they would have if they just remained perfectly straight in their seats. This has caused some to call it the 'Ocrist Handle' because of what people shout when they grab it in such a situation.

 

When the Angel abruptly turned right and drove right off the edge of a cliff to literally start driving right down the side of the mountain, Toshi happened to be one of those people. He reached up and yelled, "OH CHRIST!" as they drove at an angle that was only one step removed from free fall.

 

Said screaming took on a new fevered pitch when the handle broke loose in his hands.

 

By what could be said to be divine intervention in a most literal sense, the car careened out of the mountain brush and straightened out on the exit road as they leaped the last bend to leave the hospital's property and rejoin the road proper. Tires squealed as the vehicle tried to accelerate and purchase traction as it landed. Yumi squealed in her own way, "Are you trying to kill us???"

 

The angel possessed orderly rolled her eyes as the vehicle went up on two wheels, "Why yes! I went through all this trouble just to murder you! It would have been SO much easier to kill you in the hospital, but NO, I thought to myself, why not do it in the most convoluted and troublesome way possible for the maximum amount of pain in my ass!" This was the first time the angel's voice showed any sort of emotion or inflection.

 

Toshi held the now broken-off 'Ocrist' tightly in both hands, "You don't have to be sarcastic!"

 

The vehicle shot out onto a main road, nearly driving another car off the road in the process, "Oh yes I do! If I only had to get YOU out of here, all this would have been much more simple! Maybe I could have gotten you out there unobserved! But NO! I have to save these two because of you and now it's hot on our trail! Sarcasm is the only form of happiness I have left right now!" The angel's face contorted with frustration as she hunched over the steering wheel, as if crowding up on it allowed her to drive a little bit faster.

 

Yori was holding his sister down to keep her from bouncing around in the back seat, "It? What the hell is IT?"

 

The angel glanced up at the rearview mirror, "How do I put this?" She  took a hard right onto an on ramp to get up on a highway, only to cut across several lanes of traffic and jump the far side. She drove the car through tall grass to a maintenance road that ran parallel to said highway and started using that as a shortcut to some unknown destination, "Well, we're kind of short staffed in Heaven at the moment, what with the war going on. So I'm ...  from... How do I put this in a way you can conceptualize... The secretarial pool?" She nodded to herself as if that sounded right, "Yes. THAT! And we... are being chased by..." Several seconds ticked by.

 

"The angelic equivalent to Godzilla."

 

Toshi blinked, "Why?"

 

The angel rolled her eyes as they took a sharp turn and pulled out onto another back road, "I do not have time to explain interdimensional politics. Let's just say an angel from a rival god from another universe has been snooping around and is trying to poach some souls." She glanced at Toshi, "Strongest soul on the planet." She jogged her head towards the back seat, "Meet the second strongest soul on the planet."

 

Yumi was trying to follow along with the conversation without throwing up as the vehicle careened along, "Wait wait wait... Are you talking about me?"

 

Toshi waved at her to keep quiet and returned his attention to the driver, "God can't do anything?"

 

The angel snorted, "God's out of... town?" She shook her head slightly, "Something like that. He's fighting in the great war... for YOUR sake, I might add, you ungrateful hairless monkeys." She shook her head, "I don't understand him. He is way too indulgent.  If you humans only knew what he gave up for you. What he sacrificed..." She gripped the steering wheel tighter causing the decorative, novelty steering wheel cover that was official merchandise of the cartoon Voltron to deform, "Every last one of you should be on your hands and knees giving him praise every second of every DAY for-"

 

Toshi snapped his fingers, "HEY! FOCUS!" He gestured over his shoulder, "We're being chased, remember?"

 

The Angel turned the wheel abruptly to send the vehicle heading down another road, "Oh, He's not behind us in a physical sense. He's following us in a memetic sense."

 

Toshi widened his eyes in bafflement, "So... why are you driving like a madman?"

 

The Angel sighed, "Because it might buy us a few seconds. I don't have any other options. We've already lost, but I'm obligated to try everything I can think of." She kept slowly shaking her head, "I knew something was going to happen. Why didn't they listen to me?" She started talking with a mocking tone about two octaves higher than normal, "Your orders aren't to interfere with him! He has free will! Only Interfere if he is in immediate life threatening danger!"

 

She ground her teeth together as she continued her rant, "The fact there was a chance the two of you coming together might cause so much feedback that you blew out the wards we set up to keep you hidden? That sounded life threatening to me! BUT WHO AM I TO MAKE A CALL LIKE THAT?" She yanked the wheel hard to the right, "I'm just a-" At that point she made a sound. It was a melodic chord that sounded like the scent of concrete mixed with cotton candy jumping out of a tin dog.

 

Sort of like that, but GREENER.

 

Upon hearing that sound, Yori's nose started to bleed.

 

Toshi looked over his shoulder into the back seat at the two very confused, and very frightened passengers behind him. All three stared at each other without a word. Abruptly Toshi snapped his head back towards the driver, "What about me?"

The angel looked at him out of the corner of her eyes, "What about you?"

Toshi pointed at himself, "Soul force ten, remember? Ten Billion Souls in one body? That's gotta have some serious kick if you use it properly!"

The angel eyed him out of the corner of her eye, "You're MAD! I can't put you at risk like that!"

Toshi scowled, "You're the angel! You do the math! Which is worse for my continued existence? You tapping into my soul, or Godzilla catching up to us?" The angel didn't say anything, instead she focused on the road.

 

She made another sharp turn and started accelerating down a straight away.

 

The silence in the car stretched on as the sky behind them began to darken.

 

Rolling clouds started to form out of nothing. The entire world seemed to be fading into darkness. It was as if something was leeching away the very energy of existence. Toshi looked out the passenger side window and up at the sky, "I think you had better make a choice before it is made for you." A sheet of lightning flashed with eerie silence across angry clouds above, "Because it looks like we are out of time."

 

The angel slowly bared her teeth in an ever increasing scowl, before she let out a short 'AUGH' and convulsed her entire body in frustration, "Toshi, Tell me you trust me implicitly!"

Toshi blinked as he tried to understand the odd request, "What?"

The angel looked directly at Toshi, ignoring the road, "Say the exact words, 'I trust you implicitly'."

Toshi seemed to catch on, nodded once, then took a deep breath.

"I trust you implicitly."

The angel let go of the wheel to drive a hand straight into Toshi's chest.

 

 

 

 

Everything went white.